NUI Galway is part of a national effort seeking to develop marine biotechnological resources. Through Programmes like the Beaufort Biodiscovery and NutraMara projects, Ireland’s island character offers marine biodiversity that is largely under-studied and under-exploited. Bill Baker from the Baker lab in the School of Chemistry in NUI Galway shares his experiences in Biodiscovery in the West of Ireland.
NUI Galway and Marine Biotechnology
The Beauty of Biodiscovery
ABOVE: The tropical mangrove tunicate Ecteinascidia turbinata is the source of Yondelis, a natural product recently approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Euorpean Commission for treatment of soft tissue sarcoma and ovarian cancer. (Photo B. Baker)
That sponges and sea squirts could cure human diseases
products, a term chemists use to describe
may surprise those who have not spent time underwater.
the small molecules plants make for purposes
However, just like plants, many marine animals like sponges
such as defence against predators, attracting
and sea squirts are attached to their location and cannot
pollinators and decreasing competition for space. Bitter
flee predators or competitors and, just like plants, they use
principles found in many plants, for example, can deter
natural products as toxic and noxious deterrents toward
herbivores in your garden, and aromatic terpenes attract
these environmental dangers. Because we have only been
honeybees. Ever the innovator, humans have exploited these properties throughout their evolution and today we find plant natural products in our foods, medicines, cosmetics and even textiles. Next time you enjoy vanilla in your coffee mocha, appreciate that the Mexican orchid Vanilla planifolia merely intended to invite the tropical bee Melipona to its flowers and had no interest in your coffee break pleasures. Interestingly, most drugs currently used are natural products or are synthetic chemicals inspired by natural products. Perhaps not surprisingly, plants are not the only producers of natural products. Bacteria and fungi have been similarly exploited, more for medicines (think penicillin, tetracycline) than foodstuffs (think beer, cheese). But less exploited are natural products from our oceans. Certainly Tyrian Purple, from Murex marine snails, qualifies as a classic example, prized from time immemorial for the intense and lasting colour it brought to materials. But humans have spent less
studying these marine natural products for a few decades, and certainly drug discovery takes multiple decades to discover and develop a single new drug, we have only recently seen marine natural products advance to clinical use. Nonetheless, there is considerable expectation that further development of these marine resources will follow. NUI Galway is part of a national effort seeking to develop marine biotechnological resources. Through programs like the Beaufort Biodiscovery and NutraMara projects, Ireland’s island character offers marine biodiversity that is largely under-studied and under-exploited. The Baker lab in the School of Chemistry has been working with a number of groups across campus, Grace McCormack in Zoology, Mark Johnson and Dagmar Stengel in the Ryan Institute, Ger Fleming in Microbiology, Howard Fearnhead in Pharmacology, and Mary Murphy in the Remedi Regenerative Medicine
time underwater than they have in forests and on savannas,
Institute, to name a few, to develop a collection of marine
so our knowledge of the properties of marine plants and
invertebrates, algae and microbes and to screen those
animals did not fully develop until the advent of safe and
organisms against disease models. But indeed, the effort
effective underwater diving equipment. Marine scientists
is national, with further collaborators at the MI, UCC, QUB,
were some of the early adopters of the Aqua-Lung, Jacques
UCD, Teagasc and UL, and extends overseas to institutions
Cousteau’s famous invention, and the field of marine natural
that provide cutting edge support services that enhance our
products has blossomed since the 1970s.
ability to discover new marine bioproducts.
NUI Galway and Marine Biotechnology
P
Plants are well known sources of natural
NUI GALWAY RESEARCH MATTERS 10
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the beauty of biodiscovery Marine biodiscovery starts at the high tide mark and requires getting wet. Our teams from Zoology and the Ryan Institute make regular forays onto the low-tide sea shore, where we find a variety of sponges, sea squirts, molluscs and algae. Alternately, we collect samples using scuba and/or ship-based trawling or ROV equipment. As finding new natural products with drug-like properties is akin to finding a needle in a haystack, we need many marine organisms (straws) to find the one that has the drug (needle), so we spend significant amount of effort on sample collections. Back in the lab, bits from each marine organism are prepared for determination of their bacteria and fungal content. Separately from the sponges and sea squirts, we culture marine microorganisms we obtain and treat each as a source of natural product drugs (straws). Because we can obtain a dozen or more microbes from each marine animal or plant, we significantly increase our chances of finding important new natural products. The marine animals and plants are extracted with solvents. This is not unlike the way you prepare tea or coffee – with hot water as your solvent, you extract all the natural products (caffeine, flavours) from the plant material. If you leave your cup sit unattended for a couple of weeks
TOP: Low tide in New Quay is an opportunity for the Beaufort project to collect sponges, tunicates, molluscs and algae. (Photo J. Baker) ABOVE: Scuba diving for marine plants and animals at the Maharees Islands on the north coast of the Dingle Peninsula. (Photo R. Young)
so the water evaporates, you will find a
NUI Galway and Marine Biotechnology
sticky residue on the bottom. Those are the natural products themselves. We do
better, an approach known as medicinal
complex biogeography that includes
the same thing with our marine animals
chemistry. In this case, we conduct
deep water plateaus and trenches,
and plants, just with different solvents,
studies to make small changes to
coastal archipelago’s, and fjord-like
and our techniques remove the solvent
the chemical structure of the natural
more quickly. But the residue we are left
product, then re-test the properties. It
inlets are home to a rich biodiversity,
with contains all the natural products
is just as important to us at this level
from our marine animals and plants.
of development that potency improves,
These natural product mixtures are
but also pharmacological properties like
tested by our collaborators for drug-like
bioavailability and toxicological profiles.
properties, and if we find activity, we
It is this iterative process that ultimately
separate the individual natural products
leads to a drug lead for evaluation in
from the mixture and re-test them to see
animals and humans. Perhaps it is more
which one had the activity. In this way
clear now that this endeavour can take
we end up with purified natural products
one to two decades before a small
way all Irish view these beautiful waters
with well-defined drug-like properties.
molecule is ready for human use.
that surround the Emerald Isle.
Often with natural products, chemists
Irish waters are largely untested
By Natalie Walsh
try to make the drug-like properties
in the biodiscovery context. The
Research Office
a biodiversity whose ecological interactions over millions of years of evolution will have produced unique natural products capable of serving as drugs and/or models for drugs. It is this promise that motivates the Beaufort Biodiscovery and NutraMara researchers and perhaps one day will transform the